Saturday, 28 April 2018

Through Poplars to the Inlet

Our schedule revealed a small chance to get down to Mallacoota so we headed off.

The small village of Bredbo has branded itself as the Village of Poplars and the whole area around there was well endowed with trees of that group. At least they were showing some Autumn colour!

The surrounding hills were very dry, contrasting with patches of irrigation near the rivers.

The row of letterboxes looks very cute!

It should be recorded that traffic was very heavy, particularly coming towards us. Perhaps it was just late school holiday stuff but I wondered if there had been a stupid causing the Princes Highway to be closed.

Soon after passing through Nimmitabel (about 80km from Bredbo) the temperature dropped to 11oC and cloud appeared. This got denser as we headed South and drizzle began to be noticeable.

I was less than impressed with a Victorian registered laden log truck which turned in front of us on the outskirts of Bombala and then seemed to have trouble getting up anything resembling a hill.. I got past it after a little while and noticed that as soon as downhill appeared it was tail;gating me. It disappeared at the top of the hill before Imlay Rd which puzzled me. Why take a load of logs into a forest? The answer emerged when the truck reappeared in front of me about 20km down the road: he knew a shortcut! Unusually for logging trucks on this road he did nothing to let me pass, which I managed after several kilometres. I concluded that he must have a long trip to the Eden sawmill or chipping factory.

A NSW registered truck did the usual business of going on to the shoulder to let me by and then another Vic-mobile was uncooperative!

We then followed a couple of caravans along Genoa Rd. I don't think the one in front had ever been down the road before as they travelled at a snails pace. Possibly this was their first trip towing the van!

The eucalypt in the drive was flowering nicely.

Looking closely at a clump of mistletoe and some fat fur was just visible! I wonder how many times I have missed seeing one in this position!

A second was also in the tree quite close to the deck. The new owners of the house next door were in evidence and they had found a third Koala on the far side of their block.

After unpacking, and being surprised by about 100 migrating Red Wattlebirds, we went for a stroll to the edge of the National Park. There were still some fruit bats around (heard and smelt) but in far lower numbers than our last visit. Pelicans were queued up at the main jetty.

The hire boats looked picturesque.

By the time we got back to the house it was heading towards dusk and the Koala from the mistletoe had become active. I decided to try the low light performance of my new camera (a Panasonic FZ300). It worked well!

I still have to work on using the touch screen to get focus on the bear, not the twigs in front of it!

After dark I tried a shot of the moon on the Inlet. It worked rather well.